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18 Managing Subscriptions and Notifications

In WebCenter Spaces, subscriptions and notifications provide users with a means of subscribing to the types of services and application objects in which they have a particular interest. Consequently, users receive timely notice of the changes that affect their subscribed services and objects from their selected messaging channels.

Notifications administration provides a means of creating and, potentially, enforcing application-wide defaults for application-level subscriptions and specifying a connection type that identifies the server that will handle notification delivery.

This chapter steps through the process of performing these administrative tasks and provides information about how to set and get Notifications messaging configuration details using WLST commands.

Always use the Fusion Middleware Control or WLST command-line tool to review and configure back-end services for WebCenter applications. Any changes you make to WebCenter applications, post deployment, are stored in MDS metadata store as customizations. See Section 1.3.5, "WebCenter Configuration Considerations."

18.1 Setting Up Default Subscription Preferences

WebCenter Spaces users set their personal Subscriptions preferences through the WebCenter Spaces Preferences dialog. Before this happens, the WebCenter administrator can set default values that determine the application-level subscription options that are available to all users and whether those defaults can be changed.

This section provides an overview of Subscription defaults and steps you through the process of setting default values.

18.1.1 What You Should Know About Subscription Defaults

Administrator-level Subscription preferences are set in a custom XML file that you create and then use to supersede the file that is provided for this purpose out of the box (notification-service-settings.xml). The settings in the custom XML file are analogous to the application-level subscriptions settings available to users through Subscription Preferences in the WebCenter Spaces application (for more information, see the section, "Setting Application-Level Subscriptions," in the Oracle Fusion Middleware User's Guide for Oracle WebCenter.)

Each setting provides three attributes:

id—for specifying the service ID:

oracle.webcenter.peopleconnections.connections, the Connections feature of the People Connections service

oracle.webcenter.peopleconnections.wall, the Message Board feature of the People Connections service

oracle.webcenter.peopleconnections.kudos, the Feedback feature of the People Connections service

oracle.connections. community, Space membership management

subscription-enabled—For specifying the default value for the preference option: true or false

Tip:

Rather than enabling or disabling the entire subscription capability, the subscription-enabled attribute merely sets the initial state of the preference option. For example, if subscription-enabled="true", then the associated subscription option is checked by default in the WebCenter Spaces Preferences dialog. If subscription-enabled="false", then the associated subscription option is not checked by default in the dialog.

end-user-configurable—For enabling users to change the established default or preventing users from doing so: true or false

These attributes work together to determine the initial state of the General Subscriptions tab on the Subscriptions panel in the WebCenter Spaces Preferences dialog (Figure 18-1).

Footnote 1 Rather than enabling or disabling the entire subscription capability, the subscription-enabled attribute merely sets the initial state of the preference option. For example, if subscription-enabled="true", then the associated subscription option is checked by default in the WebCenter Spaces Preferences dialog. If subscription-enabled="false", then the associated subscription option is not checked by default in the dialog.

Tip:

In Table 18-1, the most typical scenario for most notifications is depicted in row three.

Table 18-2lists the types of actions that can trigger an application-level notification and associates them with their related service ID.

The subscribing user does not receive a notification message when another user sends the user an invitation to connect.

The user can change this default.

false

false

The subscribing user does not receive a notification message when another user sends the user an invitation to connect.

The option for changing this default is hidden.

Footnote 1 This is the out-of-the-box default

Table 18-4describes the effect of various combinations of settings for the service ID oracle.webcenter.peopleconnections.wall.

Table 18-4 Effects of Subscription Configurations for Message Board

subscription-enabled

end-user-configurable

Effect

true

true

The subscribing user receives a notification message when another user posts a message on the user's Message board, likes the user's Message Board post, or comments on the user's Message Board post.

The user can change this default.

true

false

The subscribing user receives a notification message when another user posts a message on the user's Message board, likes the user's Message Board post, or comments on the user's Message Board post.

The user cannot change this default.

false

true

The subscribing user does not receive a notification message when another user posts a message on the user's Message board, likes the user's Message Board post, or comments on the user's Message Board post.

The user can change this default.

false

false

The subscribing user does not receive a notification message when another user posts a message on the user's Message board, likes the user's Message Board post, or comments on the user's Message Board post.

The option for changing this default is hidden.

Table 18-5describes the effect of various combinations of settings for the service ID oracle.webcenter.peopleconnections.kudos.

Table 18-5 Effect of Subscription Configurations for Feedback

subscription-enabled

end-user-configurable

Effect

true

true

The subscribing user receives a notification message when another user leaves feedback for the user.

The user can change this default.

true

false

The subscribing user receives a notification message when another user leaves feedback for the user.

The user cannot change this default.

false

true

The subscribing user does not receive a notification message when another user leaves feedback for the user.

The user can change this default.

false

false

The subscribing user does not receive a notification message when another user leaves feedback for the user.

The option for changing this default is hidden.

Table 18-6describes the effect of various combinations of settings for the service ID oracle.webcenter.community.

The subscribing user receives a notification message when the user's Space membership role changes, the user is added as a member of a Space, or the user is removed as a member of a Space.

The user can change this default.

true

false

The subscribing user receives a notification message when the user's Space membership role changes, the user is added as a member of a Space, or the user is removed as a member of a Space.

The user cannot change this default.

false

true

The subscribing user does not receive a notification message when the user's Space membership role changes, the user is added as a member of a Space, or the user is removed as a member of a Space.

The user can change this default.

false

false

The subscribing user does not receive a notification message when the user's Space membership role changes, the user is added as a member of a Space, or the user is removed as a member of a Space.

The option for changing this default is hidden.

18.1.3 Setting Subscriptions Preferences in WebCenter Spaces

Individual users set their own subscription preferences in the WebCenter Spaces Preferences dialog. Two Preferences panels are provided for this purpose:

Subscriptions, where users subscribe to be notified about actions occurring with their Space memberships and the People Connections service (Connections, Message Board, and Feedback) and view and remove their Space- and object-level subscriptions

18.2 Setting Up a Notifications Connection Type

This section provides an overview of messaging connection types, describes prerequisites that must be in place before you can define a connection type, and steps you through the process of setting a connection type for Notifications. It includes the following subsections:

Mail Server delivers notification messages exclusively through a mail server that is configured for the WebCenter Spaces application

Selection of a BPEL server presupposes that you have established a connection with a BPEL server in which the User Messaging Service (UMS) is available. For information about connecting to a BPEL server, see Chapter 22, "Managing the Worklist Service."

When the WebCenter Spaces application has setSpacesWorkFlowConnectionName set up, the Manage Configuration button becomes available on the Messaging panel in the WebCenter Spaces Preferences dialog.

Tip:

It is expected that the same connection you use for setSpacesWorkFlowConnectionName is used for Notifications, provided you use the BPEL Server for notifications.

Selection of a mail server presupposes that you have established a connection with a mail server. Additionally, the external application associated with the mail server connection must contain shared credentials. For information about connecting to a mail server, see Chapter 17, "Managing the Mail Service."

When Mail Server is the selected connection type, the Manage Configuration button on the Messaging panel in the WebCenter Spaces Preferences dialog may or may not be grayed-out. This depends on whether you have set up spacesWorkFlowConnection. But, regardless, when Mail Server is the selected connection type, if clicking the Manage Configuration button for Messaging preferences opens User Messaging Preferences, any changes you make are ignored.

18.2.2 Notification Prerequisites

Before you can define a connection type for Notifications, you must take the steps and consider the information provided in the following subsections:

If you plan to use the Mail service for Notifications messaging, no Notifications-specific installation is required, but the Mail service must be configured as described in Chapter 17, "Managing the Mail Service."

18.2.2.2 Configuration

Configuration prerequisites for Notifications also depend on the connection type you plan to select for Notifications messaging.

If you plan that users will always and only be notified through their mail, a connection to a mail server must be in place. Additionally, the external application associated with the mail server connection must contain shared credentials. For more information, see Chapter 17, "Managing the Mail Service."

18.2.2.3 Security

There are no security considerations specifically associated with Notifications.

18.2.2.4 Limitations

UMS supports multiple messaging channels, including voice and instant messaging, that are not also supported by Notifications. From UMS, Notifications consumes only mail, SMS, and Worklist.

18.2.3 Setting the Connection Type for Notifications Using Fusion Middleware Control

On the Application Configuration page, scroll down to Notifications (at the bottom of the page), and select a connection type to use for outbound notifications: either BPEL Server or Mail Server.

The next step depends on the selected connection type:

If you select BPEL Server:

From the Connection Name list, select the name you provided for the BPEL server when you set up that connection.

In the Sender Mail Address field, enter a mail address from which all Notifications messages are sent. The sender mail address must match at least one driver that is configured to send messages from a corresponding domain.

In the Sender SMS Address field, enter the four- to six-digit number that is used by the User Messaging Server (UMS) as the driver from which all Notifications messages are sent. The sender SMS address must match at least one driver that is configured to send messages from a corresponding domain.

If you select Mail Server, select a mail connection from the Connection Name list.

Save your changes.

Restart the managed server on which the portal application is deployed to make your configuration changes take effect.

18.3 Creating and Applying Custom Notification Templates

The notification messages that users receive through Worklist or Mail have a default format for content and content presentation. As the application administrator, you can instead create and apply custom templates to provide your own formats for notification messages.

This section provides information about creating a custom template for notifications messages. It includes the following subsections:

18.3.1 What You Should Know About Overwriting Default Notification Templates

You can go through MDS using WLST commands to customize the layout and content of subscription-based notification messages by overwriting the files defaultTemplate.xml and defaultTemplate_rtl.xml—when right-to-left language support is required.

You can create your own version of these xml files, editing the CSS styles for tables (label, value, background) and footers (note). You can move such tags as <payload> and <group-space-footer> to change the layout. To modify the content of these tags, you can edit the CDATA section within <html-format>.

Note that the tag <text-format/> should always be present and empty. You can use the tag <custom> to add additional content, where the enclosed <html-format> with CDATA contains the new HTML content and <text-format/> remains empty.

Example 18-2 and Example 18-3 illustrate the default content of notification message template files. You can use these to formulate your custom files.

Note:

The default content of these files is very similar. The differences appear under the <style> tag, where alignment—either right or left—is specified.

The template-file-location points to the directory under which the fully qualified custom file is located. The fully qualified custom file is typically placed under the directory structure equivalent to its namespace. For example, consider a file that is created under the following namespace:

In such a case, the fromLocation is /tmp/repository because the remaining sub-directory consists of the namespace for the XML file. The namespace must have at least the path /oracle/webcenter/notification/custom.

18.4 Testing the Notifications Connection

In general, Notifications depends on the underlying Mail or BPEL connection to be valid when the administrator sets it. If these connections prove to be valid, then, by extension, the Notifications connections requirements are met.

For UMS, this problem could also mean that the configuration of the sender on the WebCenter side does not match or find a corresponding driver on the UMS side. Ensure that the sender address (domain) allows UMS to match at least one driver for outbound messages.